Hi,
I signed a contract with a roofing contractor to do a re-roof. In the contract I asked him to add a date at which the work was to be completed, which he did and that date now has past. The work has not even started and he keeps making up excuses. I feel like I am being taken for a ride and now wan’t someone else to do it. Can I simply notify him that the completion date has passed and that I am choosing someone else? Please advise.

Good question Clifton. Unfortunately, you have to answer your own question by reading the contract, and I mean the fine print. However, since he put in a completion date and has yet to start, you can probably terminate the contract because the contractor has failed to meet all of the provisions. Now, what you chould have done is set an amount for liquidated damages, which states the contractor will be charged-back X amount of dollars per day for everyday the project is not completed after the set completion date. Some contracts stipulate how many bad-weather days are built into the contract, so if there are more than anticipated the date is automatically bumped back. Sometimes, the contractor can inform you of delays, and it is up to you/owner whether to extend the contract time. I will say this, I don’t use liquidated damages to punish the contractor. I usually ask him how long he needs to complete the job, and then add more days onto the contract. I use liquidated damages only to motivate contractors that want to drag their feet or pull off the job and do other jobs instead. Also, if it were to go to court you would have to show what kind of losses you experienced and/or inconvenience you experienced to justify the amount of liquidated damages. For example, if you were paying a consultant $500 per day to monitor the work, then your liquidated damages would be $500 + the value of your time, etc., per day.

But forget about all of that for now, because it sounds like you didn’t assign a value to days over the completion date. So for now, you need to decide if you want to terminate the contract for non-performance, and have to look for another contractor, or stay the course with the one that seems to be jerking you around.

I know, all the roofers right now are cussing me for bringing up liquidated damages. Sorry guys, but I feel everyone should know how contracting should work. The owners should also know that inserting liquidated damages can also drive-up the cost of a job. That is why, in an effort to be fair to everyone, I ask the winning bidder to tell me how long he needs to complete the job. Every now and then, I have an owner that needs a job completed by a certain date and stipulates the date, but for the most part I let the roofing contractor tell me how long he needs. In some cases, I have them include that information on the bid sheet as it may sway an owner to go with one bidder over another. It should also be pointed out that I typically only use liquidated damages on large commercial property like schools, shopping centers, office buildings, and such where the roofers schedule can throw off everyone else’s schedule.

I’m probably infamously long winded by now but I’m going to try to keep this short? First, what is the rush? Is it leaking? What are his “excuses”? Keeping a roofing schedule is tough work in and of itself. If you were not leaking and you told me to get there right away I would make you sign a waiver that I’m not responsible for any leaking during the process and rip it whenever regardless of weather or return your money and let you find someone that isn’t busy which is a worse problem in my opinion. I’m a small contractor and this year I had serious delays… delays from rain, extreme heat, physical breakdown, broken truck several times (and its not a beater, I pay a big bill on it). A bigger company could avoid these problems with mass production but often come with problems on two different ends of the spectrum… either inexperienced help or expensive help that hit your wallet directly. Thats all. Keeping it short for me

I did a tear off last month that I sold over two years ago!!! The homeonwer had hail a since then and a roofer came to his door and said he could do the job for $9,000. He found my proposal for $5,200 and was tickled pink to find out I would do it for that price. I subbed the job to my brothers and we got it done less than a week after he called. I’ve got a few other jobs that have been sold for that long but since there not calling I know there not too worried about it. Any job I sell the price never goes up with time.

I asked the contractor at the time of signing how long it would take before starting. He said 2 weeks. I asked him to add 4 more weeks (to account for delays) and we came up with a 6 week completion period for the contract. We have had near perfect weather. I am having roofers come to my door for IMMEDIATE work. This person already has a track record of not acting on his words. I feel he is just loading up as many contracts as he can and will get to them when he can. We are in an area being served by massive hail damage claims. Contractors are in the business and should know how long it takes (and factor typical delays in that). There are too many shady contractors in this business. It is a shame that they give the good ones such a bad name.

Before you act, read your contract closely. Some of the hail-chasers add clauses in their contracts that require you pay them some ridiculous amount if you cancel the contract. If this isn’t the case, then he may just be busy. If you know he is a good roofer, then you may want to keep him and just start becoming the squeeky wheel.

[quote=“clifton”]Hi,
I signed a contract with a roofing contractor to do a re-roof. In the contract I asked him to add a date at which the work was to be completed, which he did and that date now has past. The work has not even started and he keeps making up excuses. I feel like I am being taken for a ride and now wan’t someone else to do it. Can I simply notify him that the completion date has passed and that I am choosing someone else? Please advise.[/quote]